Ubisoft, a game developer and publisher known for massive games like Far Cry and Assassin’s Creed, recently announced end-of-life details for a number of older titles as well as newly released ones.
Roller Champions, a free-to-play sports game that had players running around an arena and hip-checking opponents, is one of the titles already rumored to be nearing the end of its service.
Jeff Grubb, journalist and personality of Giant Bomb, spoke to an Ubisoft source who stated that “Roller Champions will be canceled after Season 3”. This comes just a few months after Ubisoft’s previous free-to-play project, Hyper Scape, was shut down due to failed expectations from players and developers.
While Hyper Scape had a longer lifespan, launching in 2020 and ending service in 2022, games like Hyper Scape and Roller Champions tend to last much, much longer. Many free titles can enjoy a lifespan of at least 5 years with proper support. Hyper Scape ran for 2 years and Roller Champions is only two months old at the time of writing.
In addition, Ubisoft announced that it was canceling two new entries in upcoming popular franchises: Ghost Recon Frontline and Splinter Cell VR. Announced during Ubisoft’s shareholder meeting last week, the announcements were made alongside the cancellation of two other unannounced projects.
Earlier this month, Ubisoft also announced that it would be shutting down servers for several older titles in its library, including fan favorites such as Assassin’s Creed 2, 3 and Brotherhood, Far Cry 3, and ZombiU. The full list of affected games can be found here, and some of them will even make DLC released for the game impossible to access, such as the Assassin’s Creed games.
This has naturally upset many fans who paid money for these products. In addition to many quote-tweets denouncing the changes, many simply posted images of pirates of popular shows, hinting at the “pirate’s life” of hacking abandoned games. With so many cancellations, it’s unclear what Ubisoft’s plan will be to support upcoming projects, such as the upcoming Assassin’s Creed, which is reportedly in Baghdad.
Original report by The Gamer.
Written by Junior Miyai on behalf of GLHF.